ARGENTINA: Falkland Islanders Won’t be Seduced

By Marcela Valente Reprint | | Print |

Marcela Valente

BUENOS AIRES, Mar 4 1996 (IPS) - Britain’s unilateral decision to charge for fishing rights in the waters around the Georgia Islands in the South Atlantic demonstrated how President Carlos Menem has failed to “seduce” the islanders.

Two British vessels caught an Argentine fishing vessel working the Georgian waters 1,000 kilometres south of the Falklands Friday, forcing the captain to pay 110,000 dollars for the right to fish black hake in their territorial waters.

Carlos Perez of the opposition Radical Civic Union told IPS the imposition of this tribute “was not only a step backwards but a fully fledged failure of the seduction policy, which tried to meet the wishes of the islanders.”

Perez, shadow foreign minister, said the British decision meant the Menem administration would now have to fully revise its strategy to recover the British Falkland, Sandwich and Georgia islands.

The “seduction policy” was meant to bring the Argentine government closer to the local inhabitants.

Buenos Aires was planning to pay the islanders a special grant if they would agree to changing the sovereignty of the islands, at a cost of 1.5 billion dollars.

Argentine Foreign Minister Guido Di Tella had also been sending occasional presents and greetings to the islanders.

Di Tella sent each islander a photograph of himself and his family for new year, along with a letter explaining that two of his grandchildren are British.

“If we want to recover the islands we must look at the reality and not the fantasy,” he said.

The Argentine foreign ministry said the British decision was undoubtedly linked to the 1982 Falklands conflict.

The area around the Georgia Islands is under the broad jurisdiction of the Commission for the Conservation of Antartic Live Resources (CAMELAR), made up of 21 states including Argentina, Britain and the United States.

CAMELAR members are subject to fishing restrictions to protect fish stocks, but fishing tariffs are not allowed as the area covered is defined international waters.

However, the British authorities occupying the islands acted as though they had authority over the 200 miles of waters around the islands, ignoring CAMELAR regulations, and overlooking the Argentine claims to sovereignty.

The government expressed concerned at the action, and while Menem played it down, Di Tella admitted the situation in the South Atlantice could become “tense,” and vice foreign minister Fernando Petrella described the incident as “dangerous.”

A British daily announced this weekend that a naval destroyer had been sent from the Georgias to the Falklands, causing ripples of unease 14 years on from the Argentine invasion of the islands.

Perez interpreted the redeployment to mean London has militarised the conflict, going beyond the “umbrella,” the symbolic barrier created to separate the sovereignty issue from negotiations on fishing and oil extraction.

“Argentina must complain promptly that the payment made by the Argentine fishing vessel was carried out under pressure, and that it was in no way recognition of sovereignty,” he said.

Perez said the seduction policy had already faltered in September last year when Argentina and Britain made a joint agreement to exploit the oil fields around the islands, splitting the royalties in the disputed areas.

“Argentina lost the only negotiating instrument it had, because Britain had already said in the seventies that it would be impossible for the private companies to invest in the gas and petrol businesses without an agreement with our country,” he added.

This agreement was signed under pressure from the islanders who threatened to call a unilateral auction with the companies interested in exploiting oil or gas in the Falklands waters.

“We must return to bilateral negotiation with Britain, accepting that the islanders are British citizens and that it is not only their wishes we need to satisfy, but we also have to recognise their interests,” said Perez.

However, for the moment, the government will only protest to London, suspending Menem’s plans to be the first Argentine president to make an official visit to Britain.